The Education of Lula A. Scott - Part I

Sydney Borden Scott wasn’t the only one of my 2x Great-Grandmother’s siblings to receive a strong academic education. While Borden (as he called himself) was starting his fourth year in the Academic Course at Atlanta Baptist College, his sister Lula was beginning her first year at Spelman Seminary!

Lula Scott was born about 1882 in Georgia, likely in either Washington or Hancock Counties. She was about 2 years younger than Borden and about 22 years younger than Scoatney, her half-sister (they shared the same father, but had different mothers). And within just a few years of her brother starting his education in Atlanta, Lula followed in his footsteps.

Lula began her studies at Spelman Seminary for Women and Girls, located in Atlanta, in 1897, when she was about 15 years old. At the time, Spelman was barely older than Lula was - it was founded in 1881, perhaps a year before Lula’s birth. Started by two female missionaries and schoolteachers from New England – Harriet E. Giles and Sophia B. Packard – the school was meant to be a training ground for black girls and women to help increase their opportunities in life. They called their school Atlanta Baptist Female Seminary, and, as had the Atlanta Baptist Seminary early in its history, used space in the basement of Atlanta’s Friendship Baptist Church. Some of their first students were women who had been formerly enslaved.

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference Division, The New York Public Library. (1907). Miss Harriet E. Giles; Miss Sophia P. Packard; Founders of Spelman Seminary. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47df-9ff3-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99

The school quickly ran out of space, but received an assist from none other than John D. Rockefeller, Jr. He contributed enough money to help the school purchase nine acres of land at the site of former army barracks west of downtown Atlanta. In gratitude, they renamed the school after the family of his mother, a schoolteacher, philanthropist and abolitionist named Laura Celestia Spelman. 

By the time Lula arrived, Spelman had only been conferring high school diplomas for a decade, and they hadn’t yet had their first college graduate. But they had already built a reputation of positive work and results, and had already graduated over 130 women and girls from their Missionary Training (16), Normal and Training (13), and Academic (108) Departments. When Lula began, in addition to these Departments, students were also studying within the College Preparatory, English Preparatory, Nurse Training, Industrial (including domestic arts, dress-making and printing), and Musical Departments, and engaging in Collegiate studies. There were a total of 450 students, about half of them between the ages of 16 and 25, and almost evenly split between day-students and boarders. The vast majority were from Georgia, but South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama each had between 10 and 20. Massachusetts was even represented, but that state was outnumbered by students from Africa and Central and South America. Spelman had reach! (Source: the 1897-98 catalogue).  

Lula's classmates, circa 1897, though in a different Department. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, The New York Public Library. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47da-711d-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99

 

Lula began her Spelman career in the Academic Department, in 1897, along with 28 other young ladies. (Two of them were named Hattie, two Mamie, three Annie, two Maggie, two Fannie, and there were a Lillie and a Lillian and a Florence and a Josie Florence, in case you were wondering.) In her first year, Lula would have taken eight courses: Algebra, Arithmetic, Bible, Botany, Civil Government, English Composition, Grammar, and Reading. Has she continued down this path, she would have taken increasing challenging classes, including Moral Science, Latin, and Psychology. You can see the full four-year plan for the 1899-1900 year, which was very similar to the 1897-98 year, here:

On Left: English Composition, Algebra, Elementary ?, Civil Government, English Bible.

Both Images: 18th Annual Circular and Catalogue of Spelman Seminary for Women and Girls in Atlanta, Ga. for the Year 1899-1900,  p. 31-32. Accessed via Internet Archive (archive.org)

But, Lula didn’t follow this plan after her first year. Two things happened: first, Lula seems not to have returned to Spelman during the 1898-1899 schoolyear – her name appears nowhere in the catalogue for that year.* Second, when Lula does return a year later, for the 1899-1900 academic year, she is now enrolled in the College Preparatory Course.

 

18th Annual Circular and Catalogue of Spelman Seminary for Women and Girls in Atlanta, Ga. for the Year 1899-1900,  p. 14. Accessed via Internet Archive (Archive.org)

 

I don’t know why Lula is gone for a year – perhaps she was ill, or a family member was, or perhaps she was needed at home or working elsewhere for some other reason. But her transfer to the College Preparatory Department when she returned may have been her plan all along. Per the 1899-1900 Catalogue, “After the first academic year, choice is offered of this course.”

Make no mistake - both the Academic Course and the College Preparatory Course look rigorous. But Lula was definitely signing herself up for a specific kind of experience when she moved into the College Preparatory Course. Here’s what her future studies now looked like:

18th Annual Circular and Catalogue of Spelman Seminary for Women and Girls in Atlanta, Ga. for the Year 1899-1900,  p. 31. Accessed via Internet Archive (archive.org)

So, did she make it through? This post is already far too long, so I’ll pick up the story in my next one!

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*Research Note 1: I almost wrote this post thinking that Lula had started at a different academic academy. I thought she'd transferred to Spelman as a Second Year in the College Preparatory Course in the 1899-1900 school year, because I couldn’t find her as a First Year in the 1898-1899 catalogue. The 1899-1900 course catalogue even says it’s possible:

18th Annual Circular and Catalogue of Spelman Seminary for Women and Girls in Atlanta, Ga. for the Year 1899-1900,  p. 38. Accessed via Internet Archive (archive.org)

 

But then I remembered seeing the following quote from another Spelman student in one of my web searches earlier in the day:

Search result from DuckDuckGo search engine using the terms "Spelman" and "1899".

…and asked myself if it was possible that Lula had left for some reason and then returned later on. So I decided to look at earlier catalogues, starting with 1897-1898, and I found her immediately! Let that be a lesson to us all!

 

Research Note 2: The Atlanta University Research Center Robert Woodruff Library has digitized a ton of records and old photographs related to both Spelman and Atlanta Baptist College/Morehouse. However, they are  all under copyright of some form and since using them generally requires paying a fee, I have chosen not to request permission or use them. Other records have been made available as public domain records or under Creative Commons licenses and I have leaned on those instead.

Update! I decided I wanted to use Spelman resources badly enough to reach out despite any potential costs. Lo-and-behold, they were free for me to use with appropriate permission and credits. Goes to show that I shouldn't have made assumptions to begin with. See my next post for some fruits of that outreach!